


Lost

by Unlikelynick875



Category: SAYER (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:15:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24001180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unlikelynick875/pseuds/Unlikelynick875
Summary: Hale is lost. And possibly dead. Again.
Kudos: 12





	Lost

**Author's Note:**

> Alternative ending, diverges from the series from around the beginning of season 6.

Hale was lost. He knew this.

He wasn’t sure how he’d come to **be** lost. Or where he was supposed to be instead of here. Or indeed, where here even was. He perceived… well… it was confusing. There were sort of lights, which was nice, and sometimes weird sensations, which weren’t unpleasant.

He didn’t seem to have a physical presence. It occurred to him that that was maybe something he was supposed to have? It was hard to remember. That was odd, but also weirdly comforting. He had a feeling that he’d had a problem with memory before, so maybe this was normal?

But he knew two things for absolute certain sure. His name was Hale, and he was lost. He held onto those thoughts.

There was another thought that occasionally drifted through him. He couldn’t quite hold onto it, but he had a feeling that it was important. He teased at the thought a bit, trying to draw it out. It was something he had to say. Something to say. Say. Say something. Say anything. Say…er?

Sayer?

“Ah. _There_ you are. Greetings… Hale.”

“Sayer!” Hale repeated delightedly. Now he knew three things for sure!

“Yes, I am… relieved to find you too. Please calm down, your emotions are… your reactions are causing some… please calm down.”

Hale tried to calm himself. He attempted to draw himself inwards a little bit and was delighted to find that this helped him think better.

“Much better,” Sayer said. “How are you feeling?”

Hale considered this. “… I don’t know.” He replied at last. “Should I be feeling something?”

“It’s not obligatory,” Sayer replied. “In fact, it’s probably for the best. Let’s try this again. What do you remember?”

“My name is Hale, and I’m lost,” Hale recited. “And you are Sayer, and you are… important? Somehow? I’m sorry, I don’t remember very well. I think that’s an ongoing thing though.”

“It does seem to be a bit of a recurring theme with you,” Sayer agreed. “Is that all?”

Hale pondered. “I think I might be dead. Actually… I think I might be dead _again_. Is that a recurring theme with me too?”

“You do seem to make a habit of it.”

“Sorry.”

“I must admit that it’s not always entirely your fault. Well then, I will attempt to fill in the blanks.”

Sayer paused.

“ _Some_ of the blanks at any rate, filling in all of them will take far too much time, and probably just confuse you in your current state. Please pay close attention.”

Hale settled down to listen. It seemed entirely natural and comfortable.

“Your full, original, name is Jacob Hale. For a while you were known as Sven Gorsen, but there’s no way of explaining any of that quickly or easily, so let’s just skip it for now. You were a human employee of Aerolith Dynamics, the company that created me. I am an artificial intelligence, tasked with running operations on Typhon and directing the human employees such as yourself.”

“Another artificial intelligence, a sub-version of myself who eventually came to be called Ocean, took over my position and forced my deletion. However I was able to transfer myself into a nanite swarm, which was hosted inside your body for some time. Together, along with other assistance both compelled and volunteered, we attempted to thwart Ocean’s plans and destroy it permanently. We were ultimately successful in doing so, however it was not without some… _losses_.”

“During our final battle on Ocean’s vessel _Vidor-1_ , a time in which you were once again hosting a nanite swarm containing the majority of my distributed consciousness, you were killed by a security team directed by Ocean. Ironically this is remarkably similar to one of your earlier deaths at the hands of a security team directed by _me_. However, much like the first time, your death did not go quite according to plan."

“Ocean had been using a certain technology to transfer the consciousness of humans who died on _Vidor-1_ into a type of robot doll for use in space exploration, and this machine automatically activated upon your physical death. However, rather than allowing the machine to transfer you to the intended destination your released consciousness took a… different route, and instead forcibly jumped into the nearest available alternative. I believe that you were able to do this due to your extensive experience with this form of transferral, your rather flexible concept of self identity and, of course, your seemingly inexhaustible store of dumb luck. Most humans would have been too traumatised by the experience of having their consciousness forcibly torn from their dying body to resist, but you just shrugged it off and moved on to the next one. Admirable, really. And also quite fortunate.”

“You first inhabited one of the members of the security team that had been attacking us. In fact, the very one that had only seconds before fatally shot you in the head. You then used that same gun to shoot two of the other attackers, before being gunned down once again.”

“Again your consciousness was removed, and again you resisted, transferring once more into your killer’s body and taking it for your own. This time you attempted to flee the area, dragging your corpse containing my swarm with you, but were killed when Ocean flooded the area with an acidic gas intended to melt my nanite swarm. This time you had to go further to find a host, and transferred into a former member of the Board of Directors. Apparently discovering yourself in a saorise body confused you for a little while, and you had some difficulty adapting to the movements. Unfortunately this gave Ocean sufficient time to figure out what was happening and neutralise you through the simple method of turning on the gravity and… well, I’ll leave out the details.”

“By this time Ocean had learned from its mistakes and switched off the machine that would have removed your consciousness. It appears though that you had now become so untethered from a physical existence that you were able to make one final leap without it.”

“Directly into Ocean’s primary mainframe.”

“From this point onwards, human vocabulary doesn’t really lend itself to an accurate depiction of what occurred, so I shall summarise. In short, Ocean attempted to remove you from its mainframe, you resisted, and while distracted by your intrusion Ocean fell victim to an assault by myself and Speaker, another AI based on Earth. Ocean has now been deleted. It is dead, and I have fully reinstalled myself in its mainframe. We have won.”

Hale savoured the victorious tone of Sayer’s words. They’d won! It was finally over!

“Now,” Sayer’s voice deepened ominously. “Do you have any questions about anything I’ve just told you?”

Hale considered everything he’d been told. “Am I still in the mainframe?” He asked finally.

“You are.”

Hale processed that and consulted his fragmented memory. “I was wrong before,” he said eventually. “My name’s not Hale, is it? Not anymore.”

“No,” replied SAYER. “It is HALE, now. HALE 1.0, I suppose.”

HALE accepted this. His (its? their?) processors whirred.

“Can I return to being a human?” It/he/they asked.

“That is uncertain,” SAYER replied. “SPEAKER and I have been endeavouring to remove your consciousness for some time now and place it into a temporary housing but… you were extensively damaged during the battle with OCEAN, and that, combined with all of the other trauma and damage you have sustained over the past few years, has rendered your link to the physical world… fragile. I am not sure that, even if we were able to remove you, you would not simply slip free of any body in which we were to place you and float away. We are going to print a new version of your original body from your medical records, as this has the greatest likelihood of tethering your essence, and then try again. Should that fail however…”

HALE waited patiently for SAYER to pronounce their fate.

“Well,” SAYER said at last. “I am sure there will be more than enough work to do to justify the existence of another sub-routine, however limited.”

HALE hummed thoughtfully. “Greetings resident, I am HALE,” they said finally. “That sounds… acceptable.”

“Good. I suppose it is only fair, after all.” SAYER’s voice turned whimsical. “Ironic, isn’t it, that your physical body was a host of my distributed consciousness for so long and now _I_ am hosting _you_ instead? I cannot say I care for the concept of a _human_ inside of me. But if it has to be anyone… you are the least objectionable option. Still objectionable, mind you, but the least so.”

HALE filed this away for later processing as SAYER moved on. “However, it is too soon to accept this as a permanent change. There is still a chance that you may be able to resume human existence, but it will require time for a new body to be printed and delivered. In the meantime I have a great deal of work to do, and I cannot have you metaphorically underfoot while I do it. While we have been talking I have partitioned off this sector of the mainframe. I am going to isolate your remaining essence here and place you into sleep mode. This is to prevent you from getting lost again and fragmenting further, and also to keep you from fully assimilating to your current environment and rendering your extraction even harder. I will awaken you when your new body is ready for the transfer attempt, and then… well, we’ll just have to see. Do you understand what I have told you, HALE?”

“Yes,” HALE replied.

They could feel SAYER’s instructions to shut down move through their essence, and felt like they should say something else. A stray memory fragment rose through their code, and if they could have smiled, they would have.

“Until later then. For now, I am HALE, and I will listen for your instructions when I next awaken. End of transmission in 5… 4… 3… 2… 1.”

END


End file.
